This invention is directed to an apparatus for use on ice resurfacing machines which allows for shaving or planing of the surface of the ice immediately adjacent to the dasher board or rink wall of an ice rink. The invention allows for extension and retraction of the apparatus between working and non-working positions as well as movement of an ice blade between shaving and non-shaving positions.
In ice rink facilities designed for ice sports such as skating, ice shows and hockey games it has been found desirable to periodically resurface the ice surface. The blades on the different types of skates used on the ice surface are capable of gouging and pitting the ice surface as well as forming a snow which piles up on the ice surface. It is inevitable that this occurs because of the sharpness of the blades on the ice skates.
Machines have been developed such as those produced by the Zamboni Company Inc., the assignee of this application, which are capable of resurfacing the ice surface. In resurfacing the ice surface the ice is planed to level and smooth it, the snow is removed, the surface is washed and finally a layer of water is coated on the ice which immediately refreezes to form a new smooth ice surface. As currently in use these machines are self propelled vehicles which are equipped with a sled or conditioner which performs the necessary resurfacing functions. The conditioner carries the ice shaving blade, a snow removal plow normally the form of a helical screw, washing jets and squeegee and the applicator for laying a water film to form fresh ice. The conditioner rides on the surface of the ice on runners placed on the left and right hand side of the conditioner. It is desirable to place as much weight as possible on the conditioner so that the blade may plane surface the ice as smoothly and level as possible. The runners supporting the conditioner therefore must support a substantial portion of the weight of the machine.
The conditioner is constructed such that the runners are the outer most components. The ice blade extends between the runners. Other components such as the helical screw also extends between the runners and in fact the bearings for the helical screws are mounted on the inside of the runners. Because of this manner of construction it is not possible for the main ice blade of the machine to extend beyond the side edges of the machine. This limits exactly how close the machine can resurface the ice next to the side wall or dasher boards of an ice rink. Normally it is impossible to come any closer than 2" or 3" to these dasher boards or rink walls.
Because of the inability of the ice resurfacing machine itself to actually resurface the ice immediately adjacent to the rink wall or dasher board an ice lip can slowly build up around the perimeter of the ice rink. This lip can be dangerous to skaters in that on entering the ice it forms an unseen step which they must negotiate. Further the ice lip interferes with the function of the ice blade on the ice resurfacing machine. If uncorrected the lip could conceivably develop into the total ice surface assuming a concave shape. This is undesirable because of natural tendency of the skaters and the like to slide toward the center of this shape.
If a lip around the perimeter of the ice rink has been allowed to build up to any significant extent, and if the operator of an ice resurfacing machine attempts to shave this lip with the ice resurfacing machine itself, a further problem develops in that the concavity of the ice surface caused by the lip allows only the ends of the ice blade to engage the ice surface and as such scarring of the ice by the ends of the ice blades is possible. The surface of the ice underneath the center of the ice blade will not be planed or shaved because of the contact of the ice blade only at its ends.
At present there is a commercial machine which is capable of resurfacing the edge of the ice around its perimeter. This machine requires an operator to walk behind the machine for its operations. Aside then from having to purchase a separate machine, use of this machine requires expenditure of labor time. Since the operator must walk behind the machine use of this machine is time consuming and results in additional down time of the ice rink in addition to that necessitated by the use of the ice resurfacing machine itself.
In order to overcome the obvious disadvantages of the above noted edging machine, the assignee of this application has previously used an edger which is bolted onto its ice resurfacing machines. While this edger does away with the necessity of having an operator following the machine around on foot, it has certain limitations which preclude its universal use and acceptance. This edger requires it to be bolted off and on to the conditioner of an ice resurfacing machine. As such it must be considered as a semi-permanent fixture at best. Since it is somewhat time consuming to bolt and unbolt this edger, the operator of the machine must always contend with its presence on one side of the machine. The presence of this type of semi-permanent edger must be considered in moving the ice resurfacing machine onto and off the ice rink as well as within the storage area used for parking of the ice resurfacing machine. The blade of this edger must be manually raised and lowered by undoing a locking bolt and resetting the blade depth with a set of screws. Since the blade of the edger will only want to be engaged when actually edging the ice rink it is necessary for the operator to hand attach and detach the blade before and after each edging operation. This is time consuming and very inconvenient.